recently i started spinning poi, not staves...but wait!! don't move this to the poi moves thread!!

i have been practicing wushu for a long time now and spend a lot of my time training with weapons. in my routines i regularly incorporate aerial kicks and jumps. i am wondering if anybody here has tried doing this with your staff or staves. i've tried doing it with my practice poi but the lack of rigidity makes it next to impossible to keep everything lined up while i'm flipping through the air. ive been able to land a few simple, slow-spinning jumps, but when i try to go inverted or spin really fast, everything just goes crazy and i hurt myself but ill keep trying

despite my difficulties trying to fly around with poi, i know for a fact that it must be easier to do this with a fire staff because i do it all the time with one-handed swords and a bo staff.

here is a video with some good weapon demos to help you get the idea: beijing wushu team

so....has anybody tried this or can do it already? if not, i think it could add another dimension to spinning fire and elevate fire performance to another level!!

but a warning as well - it took me over 2 years of conditioning and training to be able to land aerial kicks smoothly and consistently. i've seen others do it in less than half the time, and many more not able to do it at all. i had to spend a lot of time doing intense stretching, ballistics, and plyometrics. not to mention recovery time and physical therapy for the numerous injuries i sustained from my failed attempts. a trampoline can help too.

Posted:18th Feb 2006Hello, I had this idea a couple of weeks ago. I tried 1-handed cartwheels with a staff, that worked. I can't quite to aerials (no-handed carts) yet so doing it with poi may be a tad difficult. I can imagine that as you twist in the air the poi will get all tangled up around your body, and that it will be very hard to get the planes right.

I havent, thought about a b-kicks yet, but i suppose that could, i'ma go out and try that today :P

B-twists would be awesome i imagine, as long as you cold spin the poi around with you quick enough.

Great idea drewjitsu, id love to see more of this style of firestaffing, however getting people to that level of jumpingness is difficult.......

Ive played a little with jumping, my original idea is based more on the contact move - continous round the back of the neck family...... it works well and you can jump every turn rather than using footwork - however im only just starting to build my legs up again............damn office type job

If you have any stretching / workout repetition suggestions they would be most appreciated

Put down those poi and pick up a stick

"...We don't stop playing because we get old, we get old because we stop playing......."

Posted:18th Feb 2006People have been talking about cool martial art jumpy kicky stuff for a while, it looks really cool but as you say takes A LOT of practice. Have a look at benders stuff hes done a couple of vids with this sort of thing and it looks tre cool.If you get a few moves down, do a vid id love to see it.

Posted:18th Feb 2006When I start playin with staff, jumping is gonna be one of the first things I work with. Obviously, as you can see with the vid you posted, this style of movement is not too farfetched with a staff. It's far more difficult with poi tho.

Definition of poi- A Hawaiian food made from the tuber of the taro that is cooked, pounded to a paste, and fermented.

the reason i haven't picked up the fire staff yet is i didn't want to mix up my grips and moves too much with the regular staff. spinning a staff between my fingers is not wise in terms of combat, a lot of things i do involve holding the staff near the ends and tucking it under my arms. this equates to burns if the ends are on fire i also hit the ground a lot (on purpose, silly!) so instead of retraining to a different but similar style, i just picked up poi because it was different. but ill get there eventually. only been at it for a couple months anyway.

as for jumping, i've found that plyometrics is most effective. you have to be careful with this though, as it puts a huge amount of pressure on your body's structural system. the general rule to lower body plyometrics is that before intense training, you should be able to squat about twice your body weight. maybe less if you are light on your feet.

all jumps are performed with BOTH LEGS AT THE SAME TIME (this is important!!!! don't up your knees by putting all that force on one leg) and immediately after the other with NO stepping or hesitation before or in between.

drop-jumping: ok, so the first thing you need is a stable platform. a chair will work for simple drop-jumping, but it's better to have something that you can jump back onto and not worry about it falling over when you land on it. i built a wooden box about 2 x 2.5 x 3 ft so i can change the height. stand on top of the platform and drop (not jump) to the ground. as you land, after leg compression, immediately jump straight up as high as you can. then try jumping back on the platform again and jumping off.

bounding/hurdling: you need 2 platforms for this. it is a series of 4-5 jumps. set up the platofrms one after the other with enough space to jump in between. stand behind the first platform , jump with both legs on top of the platform, jump off to the middle in betweenthe platforms, jump on the second, jump off, and then either land or jump again.

spins/inversions: this is not plyometric training so for this it is ok to jump off one leg. you can also kick the opposite leg/knee up as you jump for a "climbing" effect and maybe even more height. this is mostly trial and error and potentially the most frustrating and painful part of this training. preloading is key....think ice skating, freestyle snowboarding, etc. kick your leg and/or throw your arms and upper body around during the preload to get rotation. pull your limbs in to increase rotation while airborne. you need good abs and back muscles to throw your upper body effectively, turn around your torso and to keep the upper part of your body under control when you land.

like i said before, it took me a looong time and LOT of pain and PT to get this kind of thing down but it's really one of the most rewarding things i've done in my life. the feeling of floating through the air is absolutley amazing. and you can pick up mad hunnies!!

and after all this add you favorite toy into the mix and the sky's the limit!

Any of the staff stuff you can do with a butterfly in Wushu should be possible with a fire staff. Just requires an adjustment of your grip. Also, it isn't necessary to keep the staff spinning while YOU do the kick. I like to just hold the staff two handed when I do butterfly kicks.

Arials are possible too as they are just vertical butterflys.

I havn't been able to do either in a year or so... due to two leg injuries last year. Make sure your stretch and have your technique down perfectly... it's really easy to injure yourself with some of these. I need to start training again to get my jumping back up to par before I mess with em again.

Posted:21st Feb 2006i8beefy2 made a good point with the injuries, although I don't know if they happened trying to do this or something else...even if you do get the moves down, it is essential to maintain high levels of focus each and every time you perform them (this may be redundant advice to fire dancers), and do not slack off on your conditioning even if you feel confident enough to do this at will. It is NOT like riding a bicycle.

The difference between a perfect landing, a minor sprain, and a torn ligament/tendon, is only a matter of millimeters. All you have to do is put your foot down in the wrong place and you've reversed your progress by months. If you do happen to injure yourself, don't take any shortcuts with the rehab...I know how frustrating it can be . I really hate to see people get hurt.

On the other hand, I love to see people excel, so this isn't meant to scare anybody away. Just a warning on how serious the consequences of poor focus and conditioning can be.

Some thoughts on avoiding injury:

- learn to fall correctly (judo, jujitsu, aikido)

- stay confident! questioning your abilities can lead to indecision and leaves more room for error

- keep a healthy diet

- yoga or similar techniques for enhancing your body awareness

- listen to your body!

on a lighter note - did anybody see the slam dunk contest this last weekend?? OMG nate robinson can FLY

Posted:3rd Mar 2006Drewjitsu, I am a major fan of Cirque du soleil and own a number of their dvd's. On Varekai there is an act with 4 young asian boys of exceptional skill in wushu arts performing with galaxies. I am also a practitioner of a wushu art known as Pakuachan or Bagwazhan and i'm always trying get double dragon kicks or snake whips tail kciks out whilst poi-ing and staffing. With poi I find that its easiest to get aerial doing the corkscrew bending it horizontally and spinning with the momentum of the poi from pigeon toed stance kick up as the poi go down.

"Aaah fire. Scourge of Prometheus,toaster of marshmallows & irradicator of small children..." SideshowBob.

Posted:10th Mar 2006Yeah, it can be done with poi, but it's not easy. If you can do a weave, that's a great basis for all sorts of jumping moves. Something to try if your using a staff (a very strong one mind) is to jump and using the staff to really push off the ground- kinda like pole vaulting. Make sure your staff is well strong though!

Posted:16th Mar 2006Ignar's staff poll vaulting can be used as a sort of bastardized one handed cartwheel type thing too. Essentially you just use the staff end instead of your hand. I use em once in a while.

I have seen arials done with poi spun at the sides in wheel plane. If you can do them fast (and high) enough, you should be able to do them in a weave pattern too.